Friday, March 20, 2015

V.A. have a deep Albany NY connection, as they played to us like what seemed like monthly back in the day. The back cover photo of this album is taken at an old Albany club called 288 Lark Street. The band started off as a pretty basic sounding straight edge band, but then by this release completely reinvented its sound doing a 180. When this came out, I'd never heard anything that sounded so produced and well played technical hardcore. Listening to this makes me wish I still had my Verbal Assault long sleeve.

The last time I saw these guys was in Albany with No Outlet, Go, SFA, and Born Against. The band showed up a day early and my friend Damon Douglas let them stay at his parents house in the suburbs in upstate NY. The band decided they wanted to practice because they had written new material to record for an upcoming 12" called "On". They ended up setting up their gear and playing to about five of us in Damon's basement while his parents patiently did what ever it is parents did back then. This is a really fond memory.